In Loving Memory
by Stabler 'n' Gibbs' Gurl
Summary: I wrote this story in memory of a very close friend of mine that died the other day. This is a Major Character Death Fiction but please read the diclaimer. r&r would be nice, but keep in mind what you read in the disclaimer. Thanks


Disclaimer: Don't own.

Hey everyone. It's really important that you read this. A very close friend of mine died two days ago, so I'm writing this story from him. I'm going to tell you know, that Tony is based around him, not him based around Tony. So even though Tony may not have done some of the things in this story, of even if he might have, keep in mind that He's not really Tony, it's my friend. I chose Tony because he is more like Mike than any of the others, so just bare with me please. Again, this story is for a very close friend of mine, so do not get upset if some of the things are not what Tony, or any of the other characters for that matter, may have done differently or not have done at all. (Especially the section with Ducky and Jimmy Palmer.)

Thanks to all ~ Stabler 'n' Gibbs' Gurl

* * *

They all bowed their heads as the minister came up to the line in front of the grave and gave his condolences to the lost they all shared. Walking from one person to the next, he noticed by each face that passed, there was a different story lying behind each rotting mask of nothingness. Six sullen, defeated faces, lined in a row, showed just how divers and crazy their little family would have been if all seven were there. The first was a woman that had to be as tall as he was, and the large platform boots making her a good three inches taller than her normal height. Her striking raven hair was pulled back in a tight bun as heavy black eyeliner that rained down from her hazel eyes and blood red lipstick graced her face. She wore a small, black pixie dress that had all sorts of bells and whistles that wasn't normal for an outfit, he thought. But still, a secretive smile, even if it was smaller than Mona Lisa's, captured her disposition, making him wonder.

**_-_**

"_Tony! Where are you taking me?" Abby cried with forced laughter as she felt as if she was gliding through the air, being pulled by gentle but firm hands. Today was one of those days where she wasn't in the mood for company, nor to be dragged in the dead of night to a place she didn't know. Or see for that matter. The thick, silk handkerchief danced before her eye lids as she nearly stumbled over a rock. Or was it a branch?_

"_Don't worry, Abs. We're almost there." Tony laughed as he slowed down and wrapped an arm protectively around her waist, preventing any further trip-ups or mishaps._

"_But where is 'there'?" she whined as she felt another cool breeze brush over her pale skin. She didn't want to go anywhere, not on this day. Today, well tonight, she just wanted to curl up with a blanket and mourn over her loss again._

"'_There' is where you need to be." He exclaimed before she complain once more. She was silent for a moment or two before they stopped and she felt Tony turn to look at her. "'There' is 'here', where you may think you can't go, but known deep down, that you're supposed to be." His voice was kind, soft as his hands untied the makeshift blind fold and revealed to Abby where she was. She wanted to cry out loud as the tombstone stood tall and proud in front of her. But it wasn't left like it was the last time she was here. _

_As the mood light caressed the darkened marble, her eyes danced across the rows and layers of flowers, of candles, and of ribbon. She wanted to be angry, to scream at him for taking her to the wrenched place that caused this feeling of loneliness and pain, but found that she could only turn towards him with thankfulness and love as to what she saw before her. Abby looked into his approving eyes and melted in his arms, giant sobs breaking out and shaking her delicate form._

"_Thank you helping me through this thing, Tony, and for doing all of this." Abby whispered, as if it was some big secret, thankful for giving her the push she needed to visit her parents on this dreadful, horrific night._

**_-_**

Next to her was a man, whose arms were wrapped tight around her shoulders as sobs broke out from her chest. He was slightly shorter than her, and his round cheeks were stained with tears that fell off and on. He wore a crisp black suit with a dark maroon shirt that made his fair skin look almost porcelain in the cool January air. His short hair was in a clean cut and he was trying his hardest to put on a brave front for his family, but anyone who knew, would know that the line was breaking thin of his meltdown. His grayish-brown eyes filled to the brim with tears as more memories crashed over him on the dreary day.

**_-_**

'_Shit, shit, shit!' He thought as he bolted down the alley way and rapidly caught a corned that he hoped lead out to the wide open space of the downtown street. No such luck he saw as more brick walls and overflowing trash cans lined the way to a ten foot tall dead end. Gulping, he skidded to a halt and launched himself in the other direction, wishing like hell that the crazed man holding a long, jagged, well-used knife hadn't followed him as deep as he ran. Again, no such luck. At the entrance of the passageway, the suspect, a former hand-to-hand combat specialist, trained highly with knives and other deadly weapons, he might add, stood defiantly in the opening of his way out._

_McGee patted his hips frantically, cursing heavily as he failed to remember that their suspect, a Major Aaron Gorman, had expertly disarmed him after knocking Tony down with a loose lead pipe. Now, here he stood, defenseless and trapped, waiting for his life to be taken by a man whose life was crashing around him._

"_Gorman, you don't want to do this, it'll all just get worse when they find us. My team followed us and will be here any second. Don't do something you're going to regret later." McGee knew his voice wavered a tiny bit as Gorman smiled a demon look as he proceeded to take a few steps towards him, knife strapped to his side once more and the stolen gun gripped in his hand, which was aimed at him now._

"_I'm going to jail for the rest of my life, what the hell's there to care?" he asked, a cool, carefree tone sending shivers down his back. He tipped his head to one side, smiling sweetly, causing McGee to grow nausea. "I should have done this years ago." McGee watched as he smiled again as he pulled the trigger, closing his eyes before jumping out of sight. Three gun shots were heard before the searing pain in his leg brought him back to reality._

_Peeling open his eyes, he watched as Major Gorman's face produced shock and fell to his knees, two round holes growing darker and darker with crimson in his chest. The gun dropped from his grasp, sliding from his body, before he finally fell to the ground, a 'thump' making its way to his ears. Black dots started to cover his vision as he just made out a figure pointing another gun at the bloodied body, kicking away the gun, and, once making sure Gorman was dead, ran to his side._

"_Tim! Oh God, Tim. Come on, look at me." He pushed back against the dots and swarming vision upon hearing his first name in time to see Tony, a trail of dark, crusted blood making its mark all the way down the side of his head, pull off his own tie and wrap it around McGee's leg, just above the wound. "There we go. Come on, Tim, stay with me until the bus gets here."_

"_Tony," McGee croaked because he didn't know what else to say. "Your head is bleeding." Tony laughed as he applied more pressure to the wound._

"_Well, yea, McGee. That tends to happen when you get hit over the head with a rusted, metal pipe." Tony joked._

"_But why are you here?" McGee asked before feeling a wave of sickness wash over him once more and he closed his eyes._

"_To save your ass, obviously." He quipped before turning serious once more. "You sure you're alright?"_

"_As good as I can before the time being. Thanks for having my back Tony, if not, I could be the one Ducky autopsied." McGee joked but meaning it from the heart._

"_Nothing to thank me for, Tim, I'll always have your back"_

_**-**_

Another woman who looked to be in her late thirties had her long, straight brown hair pulled back into a tight ponytail. She wore a deep tan turtle neck under a darker brown leather jacket. He could see by the way she stood tall and frozen that she was not use to showing emotion in front of her team, her family. And yet, when he looked, a lone, slow tear escaped her deep chocolate eyes, but was caught before he had the chance to see if it was real. She looked as though she was Middle Eastern, maybe Israeli. He should know, he's married to one, but yet her featured have softened with what could only be time spent in the United Stated. She turned to lend a hand to the man holding the crying girl and a look of pure mourning slipped past her perfectly constructed mask and shown into the world.

**_-_**

"_Do you always have to know someone everywhere we go, Tony?" she said in a mocked exasperated voice. She turned around in the middle of the side walk to find that trusting, irritating, loving smile aimed her way._

"_I'm sorry I try to make friends with everyone Zee-Vah" he said, exaggerating on her name before heading in the direction they were going. Ziva quickly caught up to his side and matched his pace._

"_It is not that you like to make friends, it is just that you always seem to know a little hit of everyone from everywhere."_

"'_Bit'. It's little 'bit' of everyone, not 'hit', but yea, I guess I do." He shrugged as they rounded the corner and stayed in comfortable silence for a good measure before Ziva broke it once more._

"_You do a little bit of everything do you not." It was more like a statement, but Tony decided to answer it anyway._

"_Yea, I guess I do. I'm just an active kind of guy."Another smile graced his lips as he pulled open the door to the coffee shop and allowed Ziva ahead to let her in first. He was about to continue before a big, bulky guy nearly ran straight into him on his way out._

"_Hey! Watch it Bud-Tony?" The guy asked as he stared at the man before him._

"_Joe? 'Batter-Up Bases' Joe?" Tony almost sounded like a little kid on Christmas as he pulled the man into a hug and started a full-blown conversation with him._

"_See? I cannot take you anyhow!" Ziva said, throwing her hands up in surrender._

"_It's anywhere Zee-Vah, not anyhow." He was smiling again as if all was right with the world._

**_-_**

Sighing, he took another look down the line to see two men, one younger and one older, talking quietly amongst themselves. The younger of them had curly brown hair and round black glasses. His black suit and medium blue shirt were slightly pressed and by the looks of it, he hadn't worn it in a while. Dark bags clanged under his eyes and his hallow cheeks proved his point to emphasis the much needed sleep that would not yet come. His counterpart, whose Scottish voice soothed its way around the younger man, making him seem more relaxed, was dressed in a black suit, also with a blue shirt, and a tweed bowtie. Glasses were perched on his nose as he looked up at the younger one and smiled sadly. Knowingly. It didn't take long before tears fell from the younger of the two and the Scottish man went to comfort him in any way possible, which was to start on another story.

**_-_**

_The doors swooshed open to let in a very, anguished, Anthony DiNozzo._

"_I can't let him do it, Ducky, I just can't." Tony paced back and forth beside one of the cool metal tables._

"_And what may that be, my boy?" he questioned as he pulled off his latex gloves and threw them out. As Ducky turned to take in the younger man, he was shocked to see him shaking with tension and adrenalin. At once he guided the man over to the chair behind his desk and promptly planted him there with a soothing hand. By then, Tony had stopped shaking everywhere except his hands._

"_Can't let who do what?" He asked again as he kneaded his fingers into Tony's shoulder._

"_Gibbs!" Tony almost screamed as he rested his hands in his head. "He wants to take me off the case because I became to 'emotionally' involve. Isn't that being a bit hypocritical of him? I mean, __**I'm**__ not the one who drove a car off the back of a dock for-" Tony stopped dead in the sentence before letting out a shaky 'What the hell' and looked up at Ducky._

"_I'm sorry, Duck, I didn't mean to say that. It's just, it gets me so worked up that he would do that to me when he knows how much it means to me. Doesn't he realize that it wouldn't matter if I was off the case or not, that I would still work it anyway? A mother and her two daughters were shot and killed before her six year old son by her boyfriend and he just wants me to let it go when the boy finally decides to open up to me." Tony sighed before dropping his head once more. But before Ducky could answer back he was interrupted by a clearing of the throat. Turning, he saw Jimmy Palmer standing there, feeling slightly out of place as he handed him a tox screen report._

"_Thank you, Mr. Palmer. If you wish, you may leave." Ducky smiled to him before turning back to Anthony. But again before he could utter a word he was stopped._

"_Doctor Mallard, Tony, could I say something?" Ducky looked back down at Tony, who raised his head curiously and turned towards Jimmy._

"_Go for it, Palmer." Tony said before dropping his head back in his hands and muttering, "No matter what I do, I'm off anyway."_

"_Well," Jimmy started off, "Why don't you?" Again, Tony lifted his head and looked at him as if he had three different heads. But before he could voice his displeasure for the idea, he started back up again._

"_Think about it, start to look at other case, appear busy by other things to do at work, the next case, a cold one, or a three week old report. But while that's getting down and out of the way, take the time you know you would need to wrap up want needs to be finished with the case. Like you said once, when you put your mind to something, Tony, you never back down until its finish, so what's keeping you from actually doing so? Back off a bit to please Gibbs when in actuality you're giving it more than 100%. But unless Gibbs is truly right, and you really need to be taken off, then he would have done so already. You stick with what you haven't finished yet, Tony and that's what Gibbs' is placing for. Don't give up. It's not like you." And with that he smiled at Ducky and him, grabbed his oat off the rack, called out his 'goodnights' and disappeared behind the metal and glass doors._

_Tony looked up at Ducky, mouth slightly ajar, before smirking and standing abruptly._

"_Thanks for the talk Duck." And was gone before another word was said. Ducky just sighed and shook his head, directing his attention back to the forgotten body._

"_Well," he said, as he snapped on another pair of gloves. "Looks as though I wasn't needed to talk much there, now was I?" he coaxed before picking up his scalpel and continuing on with his work._

_**-**_

The last man in the row held what was known to him as silent power, the Don of the family. His black shirt was pressed behind his black suit; his silver hair and tanned skin making him look almost forbidden. He stood Marine style; hands firmly held behind his back before he looked over and cracked his pose. He placed a hand on the older man's shoulder and quietly offered soft, comforting words to the younger. The minister looked at those deep crystal blue eyes, which held to much melancholy that the Great Depression seemed to be just another birthday party gone wrong. Nothing else on the face of the one man that held it all showed how he felt besides those eyes, and it was almost too much for him to look into. But yet, like the others, a story of a moment from their lives together swarmed though his mind.

_**-**_

"_Damnit! Does __**anyone**__ around here know how to do their jobs?" Gibbs hollered as Ziva and McGee fled to their desk and busied themselves with trying to find the guy that was as worse as a ghost. With each passing day that they didn't find their serial killer, Gibbs' mood had become more and more disdainful and scornful. With Tony being out in the field looking for the bullet casing, Ziva and McGee had to fend off on their own until he came back. And as if their prayers were answers, Tony came strutting through the teams' area, a look of relief across his muck-covered face._

"_That bullet casing better be in that bag of yours, DiNozzo, or so help me-"_

"_No, it's not, but I-" Tony was cut off as Gibbs whirled around to face him, anger seething off of him. Still, a tiny flash of shock crossed at seeing his appearance._

"_What do you mean 'No'? I ask you to do one simple thing and you can't even do that! I should-" Gibbs was cut off himself as a smile danced along Tony's lips._

"_I don't have the bullet casing because I already handed it, and the bomb trigger that caused what stands before you now, to Abby. Who, I might add, is looking for prints and fibers on both. Chemical analysis came back along with blood tests. Nothing out of ordinary in the John Doe's system and the blood on the floor doesn't match the blood on the carpet of the car, but does, however, match the semen on the John Doe's clothing. So, I think Ziva and McGee would appreciate it if you stop your blame-game, actually hear what they have to say, and wrap this case up before the end of the week. I know I would…but probably not as much as I would a shower right now. So, if you don't mind, I'll be front and center in one hour." Gibbs, McGee and Ziva stared at Tony in amazement before looking back at Gibbs, ready to see him explode. _

_But as Gibbs stared longer at Tony, watching his smile widen, he could do nothing more than smile back. It was those kinds of smiles that he couldn't resist, since the days they first worked together, to now when he's covered with mud and dirt and soot. Smiling back as he witnessed light emeralds crinkle with glee, he gently cuffed the younger man on the back of the head, rubbing it affectionately before pulling back and flicking his head._

"_Go on, before you stain the carpet with your shoes. Again." Gibbs said, his previous whirlwind of emotions vanishing with the bright smile on the Agent's face. All that was left was question and amusement when Tony just smiled lightly at McGee's and Ziva's thankful faces and headed towards the showers. All he need was that smile to make it all better._

**_-_**

The minister chocked back emotions of his own before they all looked at the casket being lowered into the ground. The leader, he supposed, wrapped an arm protectively around the girl with the black pixie dress and walked towards the black limousine that would carry them away from their lost family. The man with the round face wrapped his non-damaged arm around the exotic woman before following, the doctor and his younger assistant in tow, followed them. The minister supposed that their little family would never feel the same way again, yet would never forget the young man that they buried today.

I know I won't. ..: rip m.s. :.. We'll love you always.

* * *

You can tell me what you think, that would be nice, but just keep in mind what was written at the top. Thanks again.


End file.
